VISUAL ARCHIVE

Click here to return

EARTHMAPPING
Fresco Paintings on Linen
Olga Baunbaek Reilly

Through December 21     

Artist Talk and Reception Wednesday, September 23
5:30 pm
                                   
Gallery Hours by Appointment
10 am - 6 pm and one-hour before all Donaghy Theatre performances

Copenhagen-based Irish artist Olga Baunbaek Reilly uses bold, sensual blocks of color to represent memory fragments of journeys and returns, exploring themes of memory, mapping, displacement, desire and transformation.  Reilly’s inspiration comes not only from the fresco tradition of India and Italy, but can be traced through her travels and the social and physical landscapes of the places where she has lived, including Ireland, the United States, Japan and Denmark. Earthmapping is a playful and thoughtful consideration of the paths that might be imposed on us verses the maps we create and carry with us.

Fragments
An Exhibition of Paintings by Enda O’Donoghue

April 30-September 1 | Gallery Open by Appointment Monday-Friday 10am-6pm

Artist Talk Thursday, April 30 | 7:30 pm | Reception to follow  

Enda O’Donoghue is known for his work in painting, photography, video, installation, public art and interactive media. His most recent paintings depict banal scenes of everyday life such as packed subway cars, travelers waiting at airport gates and fast food checkout counters.  Rather than being based on live models, O’Donoghue’s subject matter is drawn from snapshots he finds on the Internet.  The artist refers to the subjects of these works as “in-between” spaces, which are neither public nor private.  The same could be said of his work, which is neither the original product of his imagination nor a direct copy.  Using the ancient art form of painting to comment on contemporary phenomena, he challenges the viewer to think about the connections between fine art and technology as forms of self-expression.  O’Donoghue has been living and working in Berlin since 2002.  For more information about his work, visit www.endaism.com.

This exhibition is supported, in part, by Culture Ireland, a government agency dedicated to promoting Irish arts worldwide.

A Different Land: Irish Bogland Interpretations
Featuring the Work of Artists from
County Kerry, Ireland

March 6-April 23| Gallery Open by Appointment Monday-Friday 10am-6pm

The boglands in the west of Ireland have long been the subject of song, poetry, and visual art.  This exhibition brings together the paintings of artists from Kerry—both established artists such as Liam O’Neill and emerging talents—in a celebration of the bogland as an ecological and cultural treasure.  A combination of abstract interpretations and topographical landscapes, the paintings in this exhibition vividly evoke the people, colors, and textures of the bog.

This exhibition was organized by Jimmy Deenihan, TD from County Kerry, Ireland, and Fine Gael Spokesperson on Defence.  The exhibition has previously been displayed in County Kerry during the Sean McCarthy Memorial Weekend, and at  Magnan Projects and O’Neill’s Irish Bar & Restaurant in New York.

Corresponding Approaches
A Collection of Mixed-Media works by John Spinks

January 19 – February 26 | Gallery Open by Appointment Monday-Friday 10am-6pm

Artist Talk and Reception
Thursday, February 5 | 7:30pm

Click here for the article in the Daily News.

The Irish Arts Center continues to bring you exciting visual art this spring with Corresponding Approaches, a collection of mixed-media works by John Spinks.  In works that combine original letters from his father that offer an intimate view of 1980s England with photographs, newspaper clippings, matchbooks, and painted forms, Spinks embarks upon what he describes as a “collaboration.”  Other collaged works reflect upon the artist’s relationship with his mother through the use of pages and bindings from prayer books.  With these alternately humorous and poignant works, Spinks creates intimate, poetic vignettes that explore the intersections between drawing and writing, giving equal weight to the narrative and the visual.  At times, the artist responds to the written word, while in other works he isolates a word or phrase and riffs on it, giving the text a whole new meaning.

In these paintings, the artist plays with transparent washes of color and form that demonstrate a thorough familiarity with the masters of the 20th century, while also giving a nod to the arts of calligraphy and bookbinding.  Spinks’s works are simultaneously deeply personal and reflective of the broader experience of immigrants around the world.        

Born in Ireland and raised for much of his childhood in Northern England, Spinks has lived in New York for 25 years.  He cites artists as diverse as writer James Joyce, jazz musician Thelonius Monk, and painters Juan Gris and Giorgio Morandi as sources of inspiration for his harmonious blending of imagery, rhythm, and text. 

Ireland in Prints

Photographs by Bill Doyle

March 7 through July 2008

Monday – Friday, 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM

Featuring the work of renowned Irish photographer Bill Doyle, this exhibition captures the landscape and people of Ireland in a series of hauntingly beautiful photographs.

Bill Doyle was born in Dublin in 1926 and still lives there today. From an early age he was involved in photography but did not take it up as a fulltime career until 1967 when he won the Daily Telegraph Magazine Photographer of the Year Award. This was a major achievement for an Irish photographer at the time and was awarded to Bill for his collection of photographs taken on the Aran Islands (many of which form part of this exhibition).

Bill Doyle is well known in Ireland, not only as a photographer, but also as a lecturer in photography and photo-journalism. He has won three Carrolls Press Awards and was the winner of the Irish Independent Newspaper’s Irelands Eye Photography Competition. He has also won numerous awards and competitions in Japan, Germany, England and the United States.

As well as publishing a number of books of his own photographic work, Bill’s photographs have been used to illustrate the work of others, including books of poetry and album covers. His work has been featured in many magazines, including Cairde and Aer Lingus inflight magazine Cara as well as being exhibited all over the world.

His books of photography include: Ireland of the Proverbs, The Aran Islands - Another World, The Magic And Mystery of Ireland, Island Funeral, Images of Dublin... A Time Remembered.

Irish Travellers

An Exhibition of Photographs by Alen MacWeeney

Through February 29

Monday – Friday, 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM

In 1965, Alen MacWeeney came upon an encampment of itinerants or Travellers in a waste ground by the Cherry Orchard Fever Hospital in Dublin. MacWeeney was captivated by their independence, individuality, and endurance, despite the bleakness of their circumstances. Accepted by the Travellers, he began to take photographs. Over five years, he spent countless evenings in their caravans and by their campfires, drinking tea and listening to their tales, songs, and music – resulting in this beautiful collection of photographs.

Alen MacWeeney was born in Dublin in 1939 and came to the United States at age 21 to become assistant to renowned photographer Richard Avedon. He has contributed to the New Yorker, Life, Esquire, and The New York Times Magazine. His photographs are in over sixty public collections in the U.S. and Europe, including M.O.M.A., the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Art Institute of Chicago. He is the author of five books of photography.

THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF KIT DEFEVER

September, October, November, December

Kit DeFever combines ancient memories of his ancestors and a revolutionary IRIS Giclée print technology to produce images that celebrate the enduring qualities of the beauty and emotion of Ireland. A celebrated fashion portraitist, DeFever’s work has appeared in numerous national and international publications, including Vogue, Mademoiselle, Image, Stern, Irish Americaand World of Hibernia.

FIGHTING IRISHMEN
Celebrating Celtic Prizefighters 1820–Present

Curated by James J. Houlihan, Honorary Chair Liam Neeson
In association with South Street Seaport Museum

Click here for more information

Following a hugely successful run at the Irish Arts Center, this eclectic collection of boxing photography and artifacts was also exhibited at the South Street Seaport Museum in downtown Manhattan and at Boston College in 2008.

Click here for articles about Fighting Irishmen | Click here for photos

Fighting Irishmen: Fighters & Family
Tuesday, November 20
6:00pm to 9:30pm

Featuring:
Jay Tunney, author & son of boxer Gene Tunney
Dave Anderson, NY Times sportswriter  
Tim Conn, son of boxer Billy Conn  
Doug Graham, son of boxer Billy Graham
Charlie Sharkey, great grand nephew of "Sailor" Tom Sharkey

For tickets and information call Carol Rauscher at the South Street Seaport
Museum at 212.748.8776.

Click here here to return